Breakdown:For those with ANGER as prominent poison of mind - Mahayoga development stage meditation, neither grasping or pushing away anger but recognizing anger as clarity which is inseparable from emptiness reveals nature of that prominent poison of the mind.For those with DESIRE as prominent poison of mind - best helped by Anuyoga path (effortful copmletion stage meditation practice of channels and winds) where they realize that desire, neither being grasped nor abandoned, but fully transformed into its bliss essence which is inseperable from emptiness resolves the dilemma of the abundance of ordinary desire in the mindstream.For those with IGNORANCE as prominent poison of mind - Atiyoga practice, effortless completion stage. Ignorance not being grasped after nor pushed away, but resolved into its essence which is awareness and awareness is realized to be inseparable from emptiness.

I'm pretty ignorant, but I think I'm mostly angry and desirous, so maybe that's why I have such troubles trying to follow this path.

so what's the point to anything ground?? do you have anything you live for, you enjoy, is it all just a big illusion? nothing exists, nothing is real, therefore there is nothing to do, nothing to accomplish, nothing to study, nothing to learn, what's the point to even studying the Buddha, its all just words, and they have no meaning, is there any answer, what is the question, do you get my point, what's the point, is there any point

Am I beginning to sound like a broken record???? I'm not the only one!

« Last Edit: May 30, 2013, 09:46:59 pm by former monk john »

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to me, the signs of a successful practice are happiness and a cessation of suffering, buddhism often gives me this; not all the answers.

I see word "path" as misleading, because there is nothing to be found at the end of it. I would call it airstrip. It give an opportunity to rise above, but if you follow (grasp) it to the end, you will simply crash (death).

Death is just the ending of one cycle and the beginning of another, nothing to fear crashing into IMHO and in reality its not even the end of a cycle but rather a comma in the continium

The Buddha actually taught that it might take thousands of lifetimes to reach enlightenment, and although he may not have used the actual term; "path", he definetly taught the importance of taking the path to enlightenment, or of "crossing the river".

Trying to use Buddhism to make one's own life happy and then bamm, your gone, dead, nothing, doesn't really work as its rather overwhelming to overcome suffering in one short lifetime, better to think in baby steps, as much as I can do in this life, then as much as I can do in the next, there's no timetable, I have to be enlightended by such and such time, (Lobster???) and theres really no way to artificially speed up the process, the Buddha outlined and taught the path by which not only he but many of his direct followers reached enlightenment.

We should feel happy to say I'm taking the steps as taught by shakyamuni that someday, or some lifetime I will be enlightened and can benefit all sentient beings, not for my own selfish ego, not to impress other people at the temple, But to learn to have compassion and care for every sentient being, even our most hated enemies. And where do we start, right here right now, one baby step at a time, first we learn compassion for those we love, then compassion for those we don't care about so much finally to get to where we have love and compassion for our enemies.

Enlightenment is really not here to benefit us personally, but to guide us to be of benefit to others, as long as we think enlightenment and Nirvana are things that will benefit us personally, we are thinking about ourselves, our egos, not about others, many think that enlightenment means an end to suffering, any truly enlightened person would even be willing to endure extra suffering if it where of benefit to all beings.

So yes true Buddhism is a path, a path in the right direction, even if you fall off the Buddhist wagon, you will have done a lot less harm while you were on the path, so what have you got to lose??

If you don't believe the Buddha taught the path to less suffering for all beings, then maybe you need to read some of the basic scriptures, or attend a temple. Buddhism is not about letting go of you senses and sensibilities, its about hanging on to the goodness of your own inner Buddha nature, and using it to do something good for a change, and let go of harming.

And before you go labeling me a hypocrite, I'm totally honest about it, I'm not that far along the path, but at least I have full confidence that I take all this long long beyond the grave,and I don't have to live in constant fear of more suffering, because the main cause of personal suffering, is letting things make you suffer, its really one great big attitude change, "I know this really sucks, and I could easily feel like shit because of it, but I'm not going to let this make suffer, I'm going to be stronger than that.

Next big effort "how to practice compassion for people that annoy the hell out of me" I'll keep you posted.

« Last Edit: May 31, 2013, 01:06:34 am by former monk john »

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to me, the signs of a successful practice are happiness and a cessation of suffering, buddhism often gives me this; not all the answers.

Dogen master said that "It is not that there is no practice and no realization, it is just that they cannot be divided."

In the same way, it is not to say that there is no path, but it is the path that lead to no goal, no destination, not even enlightenment. And therefore, how can it be said as the path?

If you think buddhist path lead to enlightenment, you will be dissappointed. Because ultimately, there is no such thing called enlightenment.

The idea of crossing the island is the idea of enlightenment is somewhere out there for you to reach, where enlighten state is distinctly separate from delusory state.

You practice as if you want to become a superman, and completely want to experience different things with what you are experiencing right now.

But, have you ever wonder, how can illusory delusion and illusory enlighten state have 2 distinct nature, while both share the same illusory nature?

If your delusions are also not the play of enlightened state, what else can it be?

If anger, you think it is a poison, how can it also not the play of enlightened state?If jealousy, you think it is a poison, how can it also not the play of enlightened state? If ignorant, you think it is the mother of all problems, how can it also not the play of enlightened state?

If everything is already enlightened state, what effort and what path can you do to make enlightened state into enlightened state? Isn't that is foolish act?

How to do clean the clearness? Can't you see your effort bring you nowhere?

Making effort is like running from delusion within delusion.

At the end, all are simply a matter of do you recognize what is already there or not?

Beyond that, what do you want? Superman? Batman?

Isn't it foolish to have the word of delusion state and enlightened state, while actually they are basically same?

If you think there is you and you do all action to remove this you, you will never succeed. You will never succeed and can never succeed to remove something, which is already not there in the first place. Can you?

At the end, only when you stop doing anything within doing, within daily activities, all will be vividly clear.

Only when you stop thinking when you are thinking, all will be vividly clear.

It is indeed shocking not to know that all are already perfect, while all are always perfect.

« Last Edit: May 31, 2013, 04:18:44 am by BlueSky »

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Enlightenment is simply the clearing away of misunderstanding. When mistaken thinking is gone, liberation has happened. (Gampopa)

When we verbally indicate a thing as 'this' or 'that', our words, like rabbits's horns, are hollow names, mere fictive imputation upon what does not exist. (Longchenpa)

Yes, you took the discussion to a higher level. But now, another distraction arises. Making effort to not make effort... Practicing effortlessness. It can be seen that making effort in inevitable. Vicious circle that may only go deeper. Whenever you bring intention, you are wrong. Why is that? Because intention is desire for becoming something better. How sad.Effort cannot be abandoned deliberately, it needs to be conquered. How to do it? Through prajna. And prajna is attained through honesty. Only honest investigation of the mind can bring end to effort. This entire cage of effort is build out of meaning. Through honestly investigating "meaning" we see that it is empty. What is the meaning of meaning? There is no meaning. Set of pointers people agree upon. If meaning is empty, then everything is empty. Desire for this or that, becoming this or that, becomes meaningless. If there is no desire to become someone special, there is no desire to remain something special. There is no resistance to change. This is leaving ones home.

People think that grasping the meaning is grasping truth, but there is no truth in meaning. That is why there is no truth in Buddhism, not even one true word. It is a path to truth. Thorn used to pick up a thorn. Meaning to remove meaning. Every suffering can be traced back to meaning, and to see meaning as illusion is to extinguish suffering.

Had a thought about 5 minutes after I wrote this and was lying down in bed to sleep:

What this probably actually means is not that those most suited to Atiyoga are more ignorant, but that everyone has fundamental ignorance and those of the "highest capacity" are less confused by anger and desire in addition to that fundamental ignorance. Being less disturbed by these klesas, they likely think a bit clearer, albeit still with fundamental ignorance, and can recognize easier without the extra baggage what is being shown.

I didn't get a chance to read the other responses yet, but probably someone said this. It just struck me as funny for some reason when I first heard it before I had this other thought.

Thinking is actually the proof of no thinking. Doing is actually also the proof of no doing.

If we can realize that, when you are talking, when you are working, when you are thinking, in the middle of them, without the need to be muted and stop like a statue, you are still like a mountain.

Stillness within all movements, within all stillness.

All of them are only possible if we can know right now, right here, in this chaos, all are actually the show of stillness.

Without exception even the bomb explode in front of you right now.

View without view. Act without acceptance and rejection. Meditate without meditation. Fruit without hope and fear.

Those are the keys if we want to unlock the stillness right now, right here, if you think right now it is not the play of stillness because I see everything is moving, the bomb is exploding in front of me, i am running, i am reading right now, and so on.

If we try to understand this, you are already trying to have the view, and you will be out from the stillness.

Even you try to be like a statue, stop talking, stop moving, stop thinking, as long as you are not in those 4 points, you are not in stillness.

But if you are simply in those 4 points, you won't be able to deny the fact for yourself that indeed it is stillness when you talk, when you move, and so on.

All motions are indeed stillness without exception. A fact of life which is hidden to us, because we are too deluded to see. And not knowing this fact and therefore not able to experience this fact, freedom from suffering is a joke.

« Last Edit: May 31, 2013, 06:58:44 am by BlueSky »

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Enlightenment is simply the clearing away of misunderstanding. When mistaken thinking is gone, liberation has happened. (Gampopa)

When we verbally indicate a thing as 'this' or 'that', our words, like rabbits's horns, are hollow names, mere fictive imputation upon what does not exist. (Longchenpa)